clean linen

For our last day of the holiday, we woke up early to have our hotel's really good coffee. Then we met up with the rest to eat at a nearby cafe. It was the one and only time on my trip that I had a good English breakfast! The serving was just really big and I was so glad I shared with my mum. On our way back to the hotel after breakfast, I took a photo of the hotel facade and got a really zoomed out photo of it with my mum. The sun was out but it was still cold. There were flowers blooming but it still felt very much like end-of-winter temperatures... We were all packed, checked out and all ready to take the tube to the airport. At King's Cross tube station, my dad and a few of them had some difficult getting through so I waited for them 20 minutes before I caught the tube without them to head to the airport first, since my flight was over an hour earlier than theirs. It also followed that I had less time to do mindless impulsive shopping for knick-knacks and wh...

On Friday, we met up with the rest at about 10:30am and took the tube to Queensway tube station, thinking that Royal China opened at 11am. We got there, only to discover the doors locked and that they only opened at 12pm! So we spent the hour walking down the street and sitting in McDonald's for awhile. As we walked back up the street to Royal China, it started to rain, and just in time the doors opened! And there already was a queue outside the restaurant! Of course, dad had to have his roast duck again, which was really good and was whacked up by everybody at the table. And my highlight of the meal and the day: THEIR EGG TARTS! I made sure I photographed it and ate my sister's share because their egg tarts are REALLY yummy. I LOVE DIMSUM!:D After dimsum, we went to Harrods and everybody left Harrods with a pouch or bag or two... From Harrods, we took the tube to Oxford Circus tube station and it started raining again, which split us into 2 gr...

On Thursday morning, we got up and had an earlier breakfast before setting off in 2 taxis for the Barcelona airport to catch our British Airways flight to London Heathrow.  It was late afternoon by the time we found our accommodations and arranged to meet at the nearest tube station, King's Cross St Pancras. The weather was FANTASTIC, at about 20 degrees celcius (We would learn the next day that today's weather was FREAK fantastic weather). On accommodation, my parents and I stayed in a different hotel from the others. They stayed at Tunes Hotel King's Cross, after they got a REALLY good and cheap deal at the NATAS fair. I decided to join them too late, i.e. after they had gotten 3 rooms in this hotel, and the hotel was already fully booked. So my parents were so loving to agree to stay with me at another hotel. On booking.com, I found Comfort Inn King's Cross that is more like a B&B. It was even nearer to King's Cross St. Pancras, but definitely mo...

So I waited a loooong time to collect my luggage at London Heathrow on Sunday night. I only got to Holloway Road tube station to meet Rachel and Matt at about 9:50pm. By the time we arrived back and washed up, I think I went to bed at 11pm, really sleepy. I vaguely heard Matt moving about at about 7am the next morning as he was preparing to go to work. The next thing that happened was that I heard the sound of Rachel showering in the bathroom at 10:30am. Wow, I had slept all the way until 10:30am! But I felt so alert and fresh and well-rested. Rachel made me scrambled eggs on toast as we had a leisurely late breakfast. We caught up on life and then began to talk about what we would do for the rest of the day. We decided to go to the Tate Modern for its nice view of South Bank, and then we would go to Harrods to do a little window shopping. So this is the nice view from the 6th floor cafe of Tate Modern: It is free entry into the museum and they have exhibitions that are free t...

[To go to other days of the trip: Day 2 , Day 4 ] We had breakfast at Shakespeare's Head again, then went to St Paul's Cathedral. Firstly, we climbed up to the Whispering Gallery. It is part of the huge dome, and it is said that if you and your friend sit across from each other and whisper into the wall, the message will travel through the walls and at the other side of the circle, your friend will be able to hear it. My parents and I tried it out, but we couldn't get that kind of experience. We have just assumed that this is only possible when there aren't that many people talking and milling around in the Whispering Gallery. Secondly, we climbed further up to have a good view of London. From St Paul's Cathedral, we headed down to Leicester Square to get tickets for a matinee performance of Les Miserables. With tickets in hand, we walked over to Chinatown for dimsum lunch at Golden Dragon restaurant. Besides Japanese food, I think dimsum is something I find very di...